One of the major reasons assigned by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) for going to the polls to elect its presidential candidate nearly two years before the presidential elections in 2016, at least one year before its national executive vote, was to hit the ground running to dislodge the incumbent President John Dramani Mahama and his cohorts from the seat of government, and save the people of Ghana from the misadventure at the Golden Jubilee House.
More than one year after the vote, and with the national elections one and a half years away, the NPP appears not to have made much by way of impact on the Ghanaian. Instead, ugly noises coming from various sections within the party seem to indicate that far from its core commitment of getting the average Ghanaian on board in its quest for power, the NPP appears to have sewn more seeds of discourse than presenting a united front.
What is worrying is that the leadership of the party recognises the need for a united front in this difficult task of winning the next vote and bringing succour to the average Ghanaian reeling from the effect of the Mahama misadventure at the Jubilee House.
Mr. Paul Afoko, Chairman of the New Patriotic Party, used his victory speech at Tamale to stress on unity as a condition for the Elephant Family sweeping to victory in the 2016 Presidential and Parliamentary elections.
He said unity was what the party needed to remain strong, and assured the rank and file that the newly-elected executives were going to work with everybody in the Elephant Family. “When I was campaigning, I consistently referred to all other contestants as my brothers. I assure you that they all remain my brothers with whom we will work together for victory in 2016,” Mr. Afoko crowed in his victory speech.
He asked members of the party not to look at him “with a different lens, but as the same person who would work tirelessly” to justify the confidence the delegates had reposed in him.
The newly-elected boss of the NPP described his victory as a triumph for the NPP and not an individual feat. “I was touched when I received a congratulatory message from the wife of Mr. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey and other prominent members of the party,” the party boss crowed.
On his part, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was even more emphatic on party unity. “We will co-operate and work together,” he told members of the NPP on the day he recorded a landslide victory in the party’s presidential primary last year.
He told members of the NPP that they had “a sacred truthful duty to relieve Ghanaians from the unjustifiable hardship imposed on us by the incompetent Mahama government. We will do the work of Ghanaians with integrity. We have the men and women who can do the job.”
He said his victory at the NPP presidential primary places an enormous responsibility on his moderate shoulders, but with the continued blessing of God on Ghana, the NPP and myself, we shall overcome,” he told the party faithful who gave him a rapturous reception at the Efua Sutherland Park in Accra, on the night he won the party presidential primary.
The NPP faithful pledged their loyalty to the twice-defeated presidential candidate with a landslide victory. Nana Akufo-Addo pulled 117,413 of the total valid votes cast representing an overwhelming 94.35 percent. His closest rival, Alan Kwadwo Kyeremateng, recorded 5,908 votes, a paltry 4.75 percent of the popular vote.
More than one year after Nana Akufo-Addo was given thumps up to lead the NPP there has been not much by way of his presence in the various constituencies. One would like to believe that a party in opposition, seeking to remove the incumbent with all resources of state at the ruling party’s disposal, would be more adventurous. Rather, there are more ugly noises coming out of the camp of the NPP than party organisation to dislodge those who are making life difficult for the average Ghanaian.
Dum-so has entered the fourth year. Businesses are collapsing all over the place. Mining giants AngloGold Ashanti, reeling from an unproductive venture as a result of the huge cost of business, has already sent most of its 6,000 work-force at the Obuasi mine home. Newmont has also hinted of large retrenchment of its staff. The Chamber of Commerce, Association of Ghanaian Industries, and the Trades Union Congress are all up in arms against the government, over the Dum-so debacle. The economy is in shambles. This nation is mandated to pay GH¢10 billion ($2.5bn) interest on its loans, totaling well over GH¢76 billion.
The quality of life is on decline at the centre of the earth. Many are looking up to the New Patriotic Party to redeem the nation. But, instead of pulling up their socks and working hard as the government in waiting, there is more report of lack of cohesion and in-fighting within the top echelon than party discipline and hard work.
Negative publicity emanating from in-fighting has given doomsday soothsayers the opportunity to predict all gloom for the NPP at the polls. There is a suggestion that the party is courting defeat ahead of the polls. They do not have any scientific evidence to back their judgment though. It is only a wish being fed by the negative publicity.
Last week, the party courted much negative reportage when there was no need for it. Party meetings, like in any organisation worth its salt, are called by the General Secretary on the promptings of the Chairman. With Mr. Paul Afoko out of the country, First Deputy Chairman Freddie Blay organised what was described as an urgent National Steering Committee meeting to name party officials who were required to lead the vetting groups in the various regions.
What is distressing to many party faithful, and hard-up Ghanaians looking for salvation from the NPP against the Mahama mal-administration, was that party scribe Kwabena Agyepong was not involved in the assembly of men and women in the so-called Steering Committee meeting.
Mr. Kwabena Agyepong, I learn, was out of the national capital. He was at Nkoranza in the Brong Ahafo Region, mourning his deceased in-law, whose body was being laid to rest. He could, therefore, not rush to the steering committee meeting in Accra. One would like to believe that in the absence of the General Secretary, his deputy, Nana Obiri Boahen, would sign the communiqué arrived at the gathering and sent to the media.
Instead, it was Mr. John Boadu, National Organizer, who signed the press release announcing the outcome of the meeting, serving doomsday prophets with all manner of prophesies.
What followed was outright confusion. The Secretary was portrayed in the media as if he had deliberately refused to attend the meeting as a means of jeopardising the presidential ambitions of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. There is more conspiracy theory than evidence of commitment to hard work.
While the party is fighting for power in 2016, there is talk of people with Agenda 2020, waiting on Nana Akufo-Addo to fail at the polls in December. Apparently, their belief is that the defeat of the NPP at the polls in December 2016 would aid their presidential ambitions. They have failed to reckon with the fact that the defeat of the party, which had previously lost twice, would so dis-organise the NPP as a political machine that it would become a toothless bull-dog at the 2020 contest.
The sad aspect of this allegation is that top officials of the party are being cited in the allegation to postpone the party’s serious challenge for power. There is too much by way of suspicion in the party leadership. And that is thwarting the efforts at building a united front.
I can vouch on authority that the National Democratic Congress is hoping to profit on the supposed disunity. On a visit to a minister of state recently, he showed me pictures stored on his mobile phone, demonstrating that there was in-fighting in the rank and file of the NPP.
I bet my last pesewa that these images would feature in the rural areas, especially, when the campaign for Jubilee House gets hotter. The NDC would forget about the harm the leadership of the umbrella party has visited on Ghanaians, and try and profit from the allegation of disunity in the New Patriotic Party.
The talk of one million votes in Ashanti Region, for instance, has been carefully choreographed to justify their impending victory, even though, in their hearts of hearts, they may not get half that vote in the heartland of the opposition party.
If the NPP top hierarchy fail to unite, and on time, they may smile at the wrong end of their mouths. The NPP has a lot to do to take the country on board. United, the party would surely stand. Divided, they will fall.
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